Thursday 11/02/10 - 10am - PRESENTATION DAY

Before our presentation at 11.50am we kept going through it and making it better. We needed to slow down and speak clearer to get our point across. We also wrote down possible questions that could be asked and discussed how we could answer them.

It all went well, I was very nervous but we all did the best we could. Laura Groves liked our concept but she wanted a more dark theme. There were also comments on our lyric pages and whole book presentation  which we agreed on. However I am pleased with our outcome and we couldn't have worked any harder than we did. There are lot's we can change and improve with the actual idea and outcome but as far as group effort is concerned I am proud of us all.

Wednesday 10/02/20 9am to 2am

Today we got everything produced. I finished the Flash in the morning and then met the group at about half ten to finish everything else. The collectors cards that we wanted slotted in the packaging took all day to produce for some reason and that was with all of us doing it! Everything went wrong with them such as printing, colour, font, etc. we managed to get them done by about 5ish along with everything else. Steve went to Print Factory and Hobbs to print off the packaging and CD sticker. The CD sticker took only about an hour to do and we were all happy with it. Steve also managed to make a dust cover on Wednesday night which was good because this meant we had time to prepare for our presentation.

We went to the photography studio to take photos of our stuff so that we could include them in our presentation. However  because it got to 9pm and the university building was closing we had to continue at the library. We all went home to eat and then met back up at 10pm until 2am at the library. We managed to find a large room on the lower ground floor with a projector which was perfect for practicing our presentation.

There was a conflict about who was speaking as the girls wanted me to speak and me and Steve wanted Steve to speak. My reason was because although I seemed to present well in the library I knew I'd fall apart in the actual presentation. For some reason I just really felt uncomfortable speaking. Steve and the girls had an argument about who should speak because of a comment was made about a girl should speak instead of a boy because Laura Groves was female. I didn't even care as I was tired but Steve took offense. Everyone finally agreed that both of us should speak which was fine by me. Me and Steve rehearsed a few times with notes and then we all went home to get some sleep!

Wednesday 03/02/10 to Tuesday 09/02/10

I have not had chance to write on my blog during this particular week due to the constant group work and my collaboration work. Throughout this week we have met up every day roughly from 10am to 7pm. Some days were early mornings and late nights with all of us attending. We have worked really well as a group and have been together most of the time. We have also had a lot of input from the tutors regarding the logo and packaging etc.We decided to stick with idea of the packaging being a book. On Thursday I spent all day producing the logo on illustrator, whilst the group helped and also worked on the lyric pages of packaging. This took a while to do and people were getting frustrated with the slow pace of the logo, however we managed to all agree on an end result.

John Young brought in a book on Vaughan Oliver which gave Steve inspiration for the lyrics pages. By Tuesday we had mock ups of the packaging and our final layout ready to be printed in In-design. I had also produced an example website in Flash using the same concept as the

 objects. All we had to do on Wednesday was pick an idea for our front cover and dust jacket and prepare for our presentation. We also needed to produce the final product to show at the presentation.

Tuesday 02/02/10 - 10am to 6pm

Today we had a chat with Chris about our idea. He liked the concept but said that we need to simplify it and stick with one purpose. We need to be sure of our idea so that we can sell it well in our presentation. We are focussing on lost and found objects that can be used to hide things as well as seeming secretive. The objects suggest moods and emotions that are unknown which creates mystery. They once meant something to someone but now that meaning is lost and open to suggestion. This fits well with the Blue Roses' music that is said to be found, kept and cherished. We talked about making the CD packaging in to a book of some-sort and then he showed us the Radio Head album amnesiac, which is similar. If we are going to do it in the style of an old book then we will have to make sure the images and text stick to the traditions so that it is professional.

Steve and Lauren then suggested making it a book with lyrics and just one image on the middle page spread. We could then use other images for collective postcard like tip ins. We then took final photographs that we felt fit with our packaging and website. We might also stick with the dust jacket idea.

We still need to decide on a logo and font.

Attendance:

Steven Cherry

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Wednesday 03/02/10 - 10am

Aims for next meeting:

- Focus on generating a logo.

- Select favorite images.

- make mock ups of packaging ideas.

- Be prepared to pick our exact images and packaging so that we can start to make it and do the logo.

Monday 01/02/10 - 10am to 6pm

Today we decided on our packaging and website. We have planned all the objects we are going to use so that we know exactly what photos to take in the studio tomorrow. We are meeting with Chris about our project at 11.25am and then going straight to the photography room to get our photos. I have done rough sketches and notes for the website and also had a mess about on Flash. We have all made mock ups and images for our packaging as well as experimenting with font and logos.

I feel we have had a constructive day today but I am a little worried about the deadline. We all seem to be working so hard and really well together but for some reason we don't seem to be ahead. Maybe it's because we struggled with ideas at first. We are aiming to get the packaging done before next Monday. This way we can do touch ups next week and concentrate on our presentation skills. Hopefully the site will go smoothly if I can get all the coding right.

Attendance:

Steven Cherry

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Tuesday 02/02/10 - 10am

Aims for next meeting:

- Focus on generating a logo.

- Plan for our photo shoot; sketching & thinking about what we want on our images.

- Prepare for Flash; sketching out what is needed.

Friday 29/01/10 - 12pm to 4pm

Today we had no meeting but I have been in the mac suite. I have been recapping my Flash skills and experimenting with the images we have to make a website. I need to do more paper and pencil planning and work out what needs to be on the website. Also images that will work best. Not having a logo is a massive problem and this needs to be resolved as soon as possible.

Thursday 28/01/10

We were not aware that the presentation we had today was so formal. Therefore when we met at 10am we began to panic. Our presentation was at 4pm so we spent all day sorting all of our work out ready to present. This is when steve come up with the idea of a dust jacket which could go around our packaging. This would be the same image as the cover but have dust on it. We watched another groups presentation before us and they had really prepared for it and use a power point presentation. We did our best with what we had and the tutors liked our idea but agreed it should be more developed. From this we realized we need to prepare who is going to speak and exactly what they will say. Also to have a mint condition final product to hand out, as well as an in-time power point presentation of images including ideas and research.

Today we also talked about our mascot Peter La Scalla! That then prompted me to open the tape holder and read the information inside the folded paper images. To our complete astonishment we found that it had been signed by him! We are definitely keeping him as our mascot! GO TEAM LA SCALLA!!!!

Attendance:

Steven Cherry

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Monday 01/02/10 - 10am

Aims for next meeting:

- Develop our ideas.

- Prepare for more photography and what we want.

- Think about a logo and font.

- Start planning the website.

Wednesday 27/01/10 - 10am to 8.30pm

We have taken more images mixing flour and charcoal to create a dust effect. We arranged the objects in various ways and got as much as we can to work with. Sarah and Lauren left at 6pm. Me and Steve stayed until 8.30pm taking more pictures, but because we had spent all day on them we had become tired and were not actually getting anywhere. We went home and met up in the library at ten to prepare for our presentation in the morning.

Attendance:

Steven Cherry

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Thursday 28/01/10 - 10am

Aims for next meeting:

- Prepare for presentation, e.g. images and explanations.

Tuesday 26/01/10 - 10am to 4pm

John liked our concept and gave us more ideas in showing the term hidden. He gave us references to Si Scott, Vik Muniz, and Maria Bantjes. These will help us with our images and logo. He said we could maybe focus on relating the actual objects to Laura Groves. We have booked the photography studio for half past one so that we can take better photos and so that we have more to work with.

Attendance:

Steven Cherry

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Wednesday 19/01/10 - 10am

Aims for next meeting:

- Prepare for the photo-shoot and generate ideas.

Monday 25/01/10 - 11am to 7pm

We all met today and shared what we had brought in. Steve showed some camouflage images where human bodies are the same pattern as the wallpaper behind them. I brought in boxes and trinkets that I found that could be represented as hiding places. Sarah brought in images of vintage wallpapers and scenes. Lauren showed a clip of Secret Garden where a little girls finds a key which was hidden in a box covered in dust. We then thought of creating a scene full of secret object covered in dust.After going in town to find ways of creating dust and finding new objects, we set up a scene in the studio and took photos.

I also bought a an old random tape from a charity shop thinking that we could hide something within it. We took the price sticker off it expecting to see an italian stallion on the cover as it

was labeled 'Peter La Scalla'. Instead was an image of a comical Peter Kay look-a-like, which we all found hilarious. We have therefore nominated him as our mascot and lucky charm!

Attendance:

Steven Cherry

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Tuesday 26/01/10 - 10am

Aims for next meeting:

- experiment with our photos and get ready for our meeting with John.

Friday 22/01/10 - 11am to 4pm

When Steve arrived we told him about the meeting with Ian. He couldn't understand why we had talked about trees, when we all said we'd stay away from literal forests but may include trees within different formats. But the Friday before he left for Berlin we had given each other tasks. Mine was to get as many tree and forest imagery so that we can see if we do or don't want to use them and to spark ideas. So because of this we only had my images to work with and to show to Ian. We had done lot's of work but were just struggling to come up with an initial concept.

We then suggested our new concept to Steve and he liked it. We looked at the Secret Garden and started to think about how we could develop the theme hidden.

Attendance:

Steven Cherry

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Monday 25/01/10 - 11am

Aims for next meeting:

- Collect imagery and objects related to hidden.

Thursday 21/01/10 - 12pm to 5pm

We have had a meeting with Ian and shared our ideas about a lonely object within a forest. Whilst I was trying to explain this idea I started to realize that we hadn't actually come up with a real concept and it felt like we hadn't actually got anywhere at all. Ian agreed with this and said we were being to literal towards trees. This kicked us in the right place as we were stuck on a loop not getting anywhere. Later in the studio we looked at references and discussed other ideas. Lauren then started to talk about secrets and The Secret Garden film. We then come up with the concept of hidden. This relates to Blue Roses as Laura talks about her music being found kept and cherished.

Attendance:

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Friday 22/01/10 - 11am

Aims for next meeting:

- Look in to the concept of secrets, hidden and revealing more and bring in ideas.

Tues 19/01/10 - 11am to 2pm

Today I met with Lauren in the main studio. I gave her all of the photos I had taken of trees and also uploaded them onto our Facebook page. We talked about what images we liked and ones we didn't. We agreed to both work on the photos and experiment with them for new ideas. We both liked the idea of having a blue chair in our images as it represented some sort of loneliness and childlike feelings. It was also placing a man made object which was original a natural substance in a natural surrounding just like the unnaturalness of a blue rose. We talked about creating a logo and burning it on to the chair.

Lauren has shared some useful links from the website Sleevage. This will help develop new ideas.

http://sleevage.com/the-rolling-stones-some-girls/

http://sleevage.com/vonnegut-dollhouse-ornamental-etherworld/

http://sleevage.com/brendan-benson-the-alternative-to-love/

http://sleevage.com/faker-be-the-twilight/

Attendance:

Lauren Avery

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Thursday 19/01/10 - 12pm

Tutor meeting - 2pm

Aims for next meeting:

- Experiment and play with our ideas coming up with as many images as possible.

- We can then chose what we like when we all meet next Friday together when we are all here.

- Upload images on Facebook so that we are all aware of each others progress.

Friday 15/01/10 - 11am to 2pm

More discussing was done today about general ideas. Steve and Sarah mentioned they wanted to steer clear of typical forest images as they feel it too obvious. We also thought of not mistaking tall pine like forests with Tim Burton like forests.

Steve will be absent from next Monday to Thursday due the Berlin Trip and Sarah is away for her birthday next Monday and Tuesday. We will still be arranging meetings for who is available. Our next meeting is next Tuesday with me and Lauren. We have made a Facebook group for the four of us so that we can keep each other updated with our progress all of next week.

I want to watch AntiChrist this weekend as Steve showed us some stills from the film which I feel give me some inspiration. John Young also mentioned it and commented how it was beautifully well made.

Attendance:

Steven Cherry

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Tuesday 18/01/10 - 11am

Aims for next meeting:

- Experiment and play with our ideas coming up with as many images as possible.

- We can then chose what we like when we all meet next Friday together when we are all here.

- Upload images on Facebook so that we are all aware of each others progress.

- Get tree images from back in Bolton.

Thursday 14/01/10 - 10am to 12pm

After doing a show and tell of our research we also showed each other books and websites. We then split up for half an hour and collected any images that we felt were relevant to the project. When we met back up in the main studio we stcuk these down on large pieces of paper and started a word and image brain storm. Picking out images we liked we started to talk about themes we could go for.

Possible products ideas came up in discussion but we are trying to focus on images and themes first and then apply this to a packaging, etc.

Themes:

- solitary

- alone

- dark

- earthy

- tall trees/forests

- beautiful

Attendance:

Steven Cherry

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Friday 15/01/10 - 11am

Aims for next meeting:

- Think of imagery that represents Blue Roses and make sketches, etc.

Wednesday 13/01/10 2pm to 6.30pm

Today I have been in meetings about my option module choice. At 2pm I went to the mac suit to do some research and saw Steve. We stayed until about 6.30pm, collecting research and discussing ideas ready for the group meeting tomorrow.

I also looked in to Twin Peaks last night and found out that it was a series based on a murder of a 17 year old girl. David Lynch also made a film based on the series with most of the same characters. I understand the kind of trees and forests that Laura Groves is referencing. The film is mysterious and strange which is relevant to the brief. There is also referencing in the film to a blue rose. It is seen as a symbol towards crime and you here the phrase 'blue rose case.' However you don't actually find out what it represents. The film is full of mystery and carries a dark theme throughout.

First Group Meeting - Tues 12/01/10 12pm to 1.30pm

Today I met my group, Steven Cherry (graphics/viscom), Lauren Avery (graphics/illustration) and Sarah Baker (graphics/illustration). I see Steve quite a lot in the studio but I have never worked with Sarah and Lauren. In our group their are two of us doing visual communication and two doing illustration. We all have different skills and ideas and from first impressions we all seem to get on.

We all went through the brief and decided on the first project with the singer/songwriter Laura Groves also known as Blue Roses. From doing a bit of brief research we all got a general feel for the music of Blue Roses, e.g. earthy, vintage, folky, etc. I'm also going to find out more about David Lynch's Twin Peaks which is mentioned in the brief. I'm also going to find out more about David Lynch's Twin Peaks which is mentioned in the brief. I'm also going to find out more about David Lynch's Twin Peaks which is mentioned in the brief.

Attendance:

Steven Cherry

Lauren Avery

Sarah Baker

Jade Wells

Next meeting:

Thursday 14/01/10 - 10am

Aims for next meeting:

- Research Laura Groves/Blue Roses.

- Jot down initial ideas and impressions.

- Bring in portfolio to help give each other an idea of our own work.